Bill Simmons’s Boston roots still matter as his star keeps rising with HBO show
COMMENTARY
Several years and accomplishments ago, after Bill Simmons joined ESPN and began writing for Jimmy Kimmel and saw his profile and popularity grow exponentially, he used to break out a go-to line when mentioning his famous new friends.
“I’m not a celebrity,” he would write, before mentioning Kimmel or Adam Carolla, or, I don’t know, Jon Hamm or some other A-lister he knew later on. It was an amusing bit of recurring attempted humility, because of course he was a celebrity, or well on his way to becoming one.
For his long-time readers – and I’m someone who has been on board since his Digital City Boston days in the late ‘90s, when he wrote in a relatable, genuine, hilarious voice unlike any I’d ever read in print – that was reason for both pride and worry. We were thrilled to see Simmons’s star rise and rise and rise, until he reached a stratosphere with his wildly successful Sports Guy column and his podcast and Grantland and the 30 for 30 documentary series that few if any sportswriters have ever dreamed of approaching, let alone attained.
But those of us who remember him from way back when, who remember his early TV appearances on NECN with Mike Giardi and Sports Final with Bob Lobel, worried that the longer he lived and thrived in Los Angeles, the more detached he’d become from his Boston roots.
Recently, in advance of the premiere of his new HBO talk show, Any Given Wednesday, which debuts on Wednesday, I did a Q&A with Simmons for The Boston Globe Magazine. One of my curiosities going into the conversation was whether he was sentimental or nostalgic for his Boston days – mostly, whether he ever looked back since he’s spent so much time surging ahead.
His answer to that question was perfect.
“I think about that all the time,’’ said Simmons. “I think I’ve been really lucky. Twenty years ago, I met my buddy J-Bug. We started working at this restaurant together. I literally had no income. I was trying to freelance, and it literally was a disaster. I wrote like one thing for the Worcester Phoenix in two months. And I was like, yeah, I’m going to freelance. I basically just bartended and was a waiter for a good solid year before I launched my site.
“People know my story, but it’s hard not to think about it. I always thought something good would happen but I never really knew it. You gave up hope a lot of times, or you begin to doubt that it will happen, or you get down, I know there are lot of people out there that probably feel that way. I think about that all the time. It would be weird not to.”
It was then that Simmons told a story about his early days as a Boston sports fan, one that is relatable to fans of a certain age – and perhaps fans of any age who truly comprehend the history around here.
“It’s funny, someone recently emailed me the clip of the [Carlton] Fisk-Lou Piniella fight [between the Red Sox and Yankees in 1976]. I was living in Chestnut Hill when that fight happened. It was mom’s birthday and they were having a party for her downstairs. I was watching the game upstairs, and it was one of the three most exciting moments of my life up to that point. And we just got our ass kicked. I’m watching [Red Sox pitcher] Bill Lee come off the field holding his arm like he just got assassinated and I got mad all over again. That was Red Sox-Yankees in a nutshell. We had a fight, and of course we had the guy that hobbled off the field with a broken shoulder. They just killed us in that fight other than one punch Fisk got in. That’s how we grew up. We had a fight with the Yankees, and we lost. So to have that flip has been pretty nice.”
The HBO show brings Simmons to an entirely different stratosphere of fame. He’s a celebrity among celebrities now. Ben Affleck is one of his guests in the debut episode. They’ll talk about Boston, and though they are of the opposite coast now, they’ll talk about it as if it’s still a major part of them. Because, happily, it is.
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com